Tuesday, December 13, 2016

Safe Anesthesia At The VA Assured

Safety first. Safety always. The VA system has made its final ruling on the use of CRNA's in the operating room. They wisely sided with having physician anesthesiologists continue to lead the operating team in safely administering anesthetics to our nation's veterans. Thanks to over 200,000 comments submitted to the VA advocating for anesthesiologists in the OR, there will be no CRNA's practicing independently at the VA hospitals endangering our patriots with their inferior anesthesia training. By contrast only a little over 9,000 letters were sent recommending that nurses alone can take care of our veterans.

But the fight is not over yet. There is still a 30 day comment period after publication of this final ruling for people to express their satisfaction, or lack thereof, with this judgement. The AANA is desperately asking an all hands on deck offensive to use this last opportunity to voice their displeasure. They are hysterically calling this, "a slap in the face to veterans who will continue to endure dangerously long wait times for anesthesia." They are even singling out one individual for their lost cause, "the undersecretary of the VA--whose personal bias, politics, and favoritism may have undone years of work by the agency he oversees and subverted the best outcome for veterans." Bitter much? This guy should be promoted to the head of the Department of Veterans Administration by the Trump administration ASAP. He at least knows common sense and is not distracted by all the hype and falsehoods promoted by the AANA.

So thank you undersecretary of the VA and the VA department. This one act alone will help President-elect Trump fulfill his promise to our veterans that they will receive the best medical care that the country can offer. This is YUGE!